HERBIE WAS in his room at the Strategic Defense training center, sore from exertion and with tired arms from firing a pistol—something he discovered he did very accurately. His cell phone rang.

“Herb Fisher.”

“Mr. Fisher, this is the director at the farm,” a male voice said. “I’m afraid I have some bad news.”

Oh, God, Herbie thought, the kid has died, or something.

“What’s happened?”

“We allowed young Mr. Brennan to make a day trip into the village with a staff member, and he managed to get away from him. We haven’t been able to locate the boy.”

“Have you called the police?”

“No, he hasn’t committed a crime, and he was here voluntarily.”

“But he committed himself.”

“He agreed to that under your guardianship, but that’s no longer in effect.”

“Why not?”

“Because he had his twenty-first birthday the day before yesterday.”

“Shit,” Herbie said.

“Well, yes. I’m afraid there’s nothing more we can do for him, unless you can persuade him to return voluntarily.”

“Thank you,” Herbie said, then hung up. Now what?

40

SHELLEY BACH sat at the dressing table in her room at the Carlyle and regarded her image in the mirror. She used a hand mirror to look at her profile and liked what she saw, even without makeup. There were still a few red places, but as she sponged on her makeup, they magically went away. She liked her new auburn hair, too; it went beautifully with her natural, pale skin color. She dressed and left the hotel.

Now she made her third visit to her new dentist for the fitting of her new smile. The veneers from the dental lab corrected small irregularities in her front teeth, and they were whiter than the originals. She had approved them on her second visit, when they had been affixed to a mold of her teeth. Now they were put permanently in place. She gave the receptionist her credit card and regarded herself in the mirror. She was exactly what she had wanted to be: a different person. No one who knew her would recognize her with her new profile, her new teeth, and her new clothes. She looked ten years younger, and she was no longer the government drone she had been at the FBI; she was a New York woman.

Now all she wanted was to go shopping. Oh, and one other thing: she wanted a man. She stepped out onto Madison Avenue and swung her long legs toward Seventy-second Street and the Ralph Lauren store.

DINO LOOKED UP from his desk to see Viv DeCarlo standing at his office door. She looked great, he thought: slim, but busty, black hair as thick as fur, nice clothes. She seemed to be dressing better these days. “Yeah, Viv? What have you got?”

“I’ve got two TROs on Ed Abney,” she said, “but a few years back. I have a theory about that.”

“Have a seat. What’s your theory?”

Viv sat down and crossed her legs. “I think he’s never stopped abusing women,” she said, “but I think he’s gotten better at intimidating them. I think that’s the only reason there are no recent TROs.”